by Dr Taliesin Coward
While this may seem to be something of a redundant question at first glance (after all, aren’t they all games?) closer inspection reveals this to not be the case. In fact, it has very important repercussions not only on how the designer approaches their task, but on how the end user judges the final product.
Designing a game implies certain things, specifically the creation of the rules by which the game is run. What is the goal? Who is allowed to do what? In what order are actions to be done? What are the odds for doing certain actions and how can the designer tweak them to achieve their goal? In fact, there are whole books dedicated to the subject of game design in this form.
By this definition, one feature of designing a game is that the gameplay is largely abstracted from its trappings. That is, the trappings can be drastically modified without altering the gameplay. Chess is an excellent example of this. Whether you’re playing with a basic wooden set on a board made out of card, or the pieces are replaced with sculpted dragons, knights and turrets, or even Star Wars figurines, and the board is made out of marble, the gameplay remains the same.
Another feature is that each element which goes beyond the merely cosmetic has to serve some gameplay related purpose. Leaving to one side the strange world of player cosmetic customisations,* things which do not have a clear gameplay function are likely to be regarded by players, at best, as irrelevant and ‘padding’, or, at worst actually aggravating. This can easily be seen in any game which is criticized for having ‘pointless’ upgrades or weapons/armour/crafting materials.
In contrast, a game world is a simulated environment. It is an artificial realm for the players to explore and play in. This brings with it two important points. Firstly, not everything has to have a definite gameplay purpose. As such, it gives the designer far more scope. Take the buckets, forks and knives in Skyrim. These are, first and foremost, set-dressing. They have been designed so you can pick them up, store them in your inventory, and even sell them – though at such small profit they’re not worth going to the bother. In short, their prime (and almost only) function is to add to the immersive qualities of the world.
Secondly, it can also drastically change how the designer approaches gameplay. Rather than asking ‘what game am I creating?’, the designer can instead ask ‘what fun, engaging, or enjoyable activities can be done within this world?’. An extreme example of this is Saints Row IV, a tongue-in-cheek take on The Matrix. In it, following an alien invasion, players get thrust into a Matrix-like simulation, a virtual city where they can bend the rules to gain super strength, speed, limited flight, and even super powers (such as fire, ice, and telekinesis).
As such, players can run around the simulated city causing as much guilt-free destruction and mayhem as possible – freezing virtual citizens, throwing cars into trucks, and then fighting the simulated police and then alien enforcers who are attempting to ‘stabilize’ the simulation.
These are highly enjoyable activities where the players can create their own fun, and are distinct from designed ‘games’ (as discussed above). This distinction is made all the more clear by the inclusion in Saints Row IV of minigames based around the fun activities. You have super-speed, so why not have race courses? You can hurl objects with your mind, so why not see how much destruction you can cause with it before the timer runs out? Or, you could use it to throw objects through coloured hoops in order to get a highscore. Sure, you can race around the city and engage in as much combat as you like, but why not also have a dedicated combat arena where you can win the gold medal?
Basically, the developers have taken the fun activities possible within their world, and turned them into games by adding a specific goal and a win/lose state (whether it’s beating a particular time or score), and a reward.
Interestingly enough, these different mindsets apply as much to players as they do designers. A player who brings a ‘game’ mindset – where everything is to serve a definite gameplay purpose (either helping or hindering the player to achieve the end goal) – to a game world, can react with confusion or annoyance when they encounter objects or information that do neither, or seem to be pointless time wasters. Likewise, players looking forward to the freedom of exploring and playing within a virtual playground, can get a rude shock if they discover the world is little more than set dressing, with everything feeling all too utilitarian.
While this mismatch can sometimes be because of poor expectation management, with the game failing to be make clear its true nature, it can also be the result of flawed design decisions. That is, the designer, for one reason or another, has attempted to cross the two different approaches. Nowhere is this more obvious in the apparently open-world game where nearly all possible activities revolve around quests (and usually highly restrictive quests at that). That is, not only are player activities limited by the designer, but also how they are to use them.
While an argument could no doubt be made that crossing ‘games’ and ‘game worlds’ gives the best of both and can therefore appeal to a wider audience base, I would argue this is only true when both approaches are kept clearly demarcated, as is the case in Saints Row IV, where players are at liberty to play in the game world freely, or play the world’s minigames to their heart’s content. Where such distinction and accounting for players’ whims is not respected, however, far from appealing to two different audiences, designers run the risk of annoying both of them equally.
As such, the question “is the designer, first and foremost, designing a game, or a game world?”, appears to be an important question not only for designers to answer clearly for themselves, but also for their audiences. ■